Breaking the Spells of Limitation (Part 4)

“There is more under heaven and earth than are dreamed of in your philosophy books, Horatio,” so says Shakespeare’s Hamlet.  Are you open minded and mentally flexible enough to take a deeper look down “the rabbit hole?”  After, all, it takes courage as well as curiosity to examine the content of one’s mind.

The spells of limitation are ubiquitous and cast their pall on what we can conceive as well as achieve.  These self-limiting ways of thinking and perceiving limit what leaders can see, say and do, thus limiting their leadership inductions and effectiveness. They also serve to create resistance to change within the very people we wish to lead and influence by limiting the capacity and ability to respond to rapid discontinuities.  We get stuck due to old patterns of thinking, perceiving, believing, relating and responding.

In the last blog I suggested one of the core tips to breaking a spell of limitation is to cultivate a strong sense of CURIOSITY.  Here, I want to let you know that curiosity is not enough.  To truly be mentally flexible and open enough to see a “spell” in action, to map it out and then to begin to break free from it requires COURAGE.  It takes at least 7 distinct acts of courage to break a spell of limitation.

Do you have the courage it takes to become a wholehearted leader in the totality of your life, at home as well as at work?  Can you access the courage to move through the fears and anxieties and rationalizations that the parts of the mind under a spell generate?  Courage, from the French word for “heart” is the virtuous action of finding your heart and acting from that space.  Courage is moving beyond the bounds of a prejudice, assumption, belief or any old way of thinking, in spite of fears, nay-saying, anxieties, doubts and confusion.  It is being willing to see, to explore, to let go, to open up and to act in spite of fear.

How is your Courage Quotient?  Does it match your Curiosity Index?